696 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ing animal till he shall possess a logical and single language for all the 

 members of the great human association. May this dream be real- 

 ized by the destruction of the barriers which now divide so many 

 peoples ! 



In the third part of the work, Madame Royer treats of the de- 

 velopment of human society. Everything permits the supposition 

 that from a very remote period the anthropoid primate that served 

 as the root stock of man became omnivorous, with a predominance 

 of carnivorous tastes. These conditions of life therefore invoked an 

 at least rudimentary social instinct — that is, animals lived in troops 

 collected under chiefs, with a tactics for mutual defense. The most 

 ancient documents, in fact, show the human species living in rival 

 or allied tribes. Hunting and fishing were the principal business of 

 these primitive races, which relied for assistance at first on their 

 agility, muscular strength, and arms of stone of a workmanship still 

 in its infancy. Flint was then very roughly cut. But now a great ad- 

 vance was achieved for man, a step toward industry and civilization. 

 This second stage was the discovery of fire, an immediate consequence 

 of the cutting of flints, when sparks would fly out at each blow. Yet 

 a later epoch probably had to be reached for the real employment of 

 fire in cooking food. Previous to that it could serve man only for 

 warming himself, or for protecting himself at night against wild 

 beasts. 



Next came the earliest industries — the potter's art, the making 

 of rude clothing, and the construction of habitations; and about this 

 time the instinct of property begins to develop. For a long time there 

 are no other securities than force. On the other hand, the diversities 

 of the faculties, which are very unequally distributed among the 

 various races, and even among the different individuals of each of 

 them, create social inequalities, the chief cause of the crime, wars, 

 and misery with which every page of the history of man is soiled, 

 and from which the original organization of civil society sprang. 



At the close of her treatise the eminent anthropologist states the 

 formula of the highest social prosperity: she believes that it resides 

 in an equal liberty for each member of a national collectivity and in 

 the free play of individual initiatives. Man will work in as large a 

 sphere of action as the right of another leaves him, striving to broaden 

 his place at the feast of life. Each one will climb the social ladder 

 in his own way and will fix himself on the step on which his aptitudes 

 will meet the best reward. Each individual will therefore gain a 

 large sum of well-being, and the species will possess a total maximum 

 of enjoyment. 



Such, in broad outline, is the substance of this book, which natu- 

 ralists and philosophers have consulted now for many years. It is 



